Veronica Ardeen
by BonesBird
Summary: A short look at Veronica Ardeen. Snapshots of her life. - mentions Hotch at the end


**Title: Boulders  
Author: Bones Bird  
Summary: A short look at Veronica Ardeen. Snapshots of her life.  
Characters: Ardeen (small mentions of everyone else)**  
'**Ships: Votch  
Lyrics: Boulders - New Found Glory  
Dedication: Paige (aka RedheadedDynamite) for being, essentially, Vee.  
Disclaimer: I own nothing… zippo… zero… NOTHING… I play with the characters… and I occasionally screw with Vee. But the standard characters belong to CBS and Vee belongs to Paige.**

**I gotta apologise to Paige, I dunno if this is how she imagined Vee's past. But this is how I imagine her. (I have included everything you mentioned though!)**

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_I feel locked away  
Feel the weight of the world on my shoulders  
Crushing on my head are boulders  
Made of lies and dust  
From all of us_

_**Veronica Ardeen**_

_**Aged 7 **_

Veronica sat in her room. By now she was used to the shouting from downstairs. Her mom and dad had been fighting a lot. She heard them both shout, she heard her daddy slam the door and her mommy cry. She knew the nights it was the worst her mom would come and get into bed with Vee, so that neither of the would be sad anymore.

The nights her daddy didn't come home were the best. She and her mom would watch TV and eat whatever they wanted. Her mom would help her with her homework for school, and she'd get to bed and fall asleep with no noise from downstairs.

When her daddy came home he was the best daddy until Vee went to bed. She wondered if her parents fights were her fault. They only fought when she wasn't there. When they thought she couldn't hear them. It made her afraid that one day they would tell her that they didn't love her.

She had lots of friends at school. But she wasn't allowed to bring them home. She didn't go out much after school. She would get to play in the garden with her dollies, but the rest of the time she would be in her room. She loved to read, and she loved to look at the stars.

That night the fighting was really bad. Only this time there was no door slam. Vee could hear her dad climbing the stairs, she heard him stomp into their room and heard him grunting and mumbling. A few minutes later he opened her door, she looked at him, stood with a suitcase.

"Be good for your mom, Ronnie, goodbye"

That was the last time she saw him.

_**Aged 10**_

Veronica sat in her room, her mom was passed out on the sofa downstairs. She was trying to forget about it, she missed her dad. But she didn't have the chance to see him, he had called a couple of times, but not very often. He never asked about her mom. They talked about his family. He now had a replacement baby, Veronica didn't want to think about it.

She looked at her mom's drinks, she decided to taste it. She found she liked it.

_**Aged 13**_

"Vee, don't go to his party!" Devin ran after her best friend. She had seen Vee's self-destructive streak, and the parties with the older kids only showed to Devin that she needed help. Devin knew Veronica was into drugs. Mostly weed, but she did some other stuff.

"I have to go Dev, it's a party!" She said, swinging around a pole and laughing at her friend. Devin could tell that Vee was pretty stoned.

"Vee, I can't watch you destroy yourself. I'm gonna see the guidance counsellor, I can't be friends with you" Devin ran into the school building, she watched as Vee fell on her butt after letting go of the pole.

Veronica was sad to see her friend go. The little girl that she tried to suppress cried at Devin leaving.

But Veronica wanted to be herself. This was who she was.

_**Aged 16**_

Veronica felt cheap. Another morning waking up asleep next to the toilet, with a hangover and a struggle for memories of the night before. She had begun destroying herself at the age of 10, and in the six years that she'd been doing it. She knew it was time to let go. She wanted to go to college, she wanted to be successful. She dialled a number on her phone. She hadn't called it for a long time

"Hello?"

"Dev, its Vee. I need your help" She mumbled down the phone. "Please, I'm at Michael Schwartz's"

"I'll be there, what do you need" Veronica heard the background

"I want to get clean, Dev, I need to get clean" she mumbled. She hung the phone up and pulled herself up. She got out of the bathroom and fell down on the grass. Once Devin arrived she climbed into the car

"Vee this is Ben" Devin introduced her.

_**Aged 18**_

She followed the hearse. Devin one side of her, Ben's family the other. Her tears fell thick and fast. She wanted a drink, she wanted to get high, she wanted to break down the walls she had built up. She watched as the casket was lowered into the ground. She said a final goodbye to the man she'd fallen in love with. Devin wrapped her arm around her. Vee cuddled into her.

She was going to college. She was going to have a career. Ben and Devin got her clean, they got her straight. She knew she wouldn't get over this.

_**Aged 22**_

Veronica had now graduated. Only a few a minutes earlier. She had seen Devin and her mom at the back, cheering her name. She had been told her father had gone too. It had been 15 years since she had seen him. She didn't recognise him if he was there. She wondered if he recognised her. She didn't know what her plan was to do after this. Criminology was a niche. Her tutors had suggested applying for the FBI, she knew that it would mean two more years of school, but she was ready for that.

She was waiting for a call that would come that day, saying if she had been accepted. She knew of people in the FBI who's jobs were to profile criminals. She hoped to be one of them one day.

_**Aged 24**_

"Ardeen!" Came the shout through the dorm. She knew who the voice belonged too, she clambered out of bed and looked out the door. Sure enough, one of their instructors stormed down the corridor "ARDEEN, Get your butt out here"

"Sir" she said, taking the paper

"Explain Ardeen?"

"I don't know sir" she was as shocked at the news on the paper

"You don't know? You're graduating next week. You're going working Homicide in Texas"

"I wasn't aiming for Homicide, sir"

"You have to have at least a year in Homicide or international Narcotics before any other unit will looks at you. Good luck Ardeen" She nodded as he walked away. She went packing up. Her room-mate looked at her.

"What was that about?"

"I'm going to Texas"

_**Aged 28**_

Back in Quantico felt like a long time coming home for Vee. She had been in Texas for too long. She had been recalled but she was unsure why. All she knew was she had a meeting with Chief Strauss and a man who was supposed to be her next Unit Chief. She was trying not to freak out about it. But after being pulled back from her cases in Texas' she wondered where she was being reassigned to.

"Agent Ardeen, they're ready for you" Strauss' assistant said. She thanked him but mentally she wished for him to shoot her. She knew Erin Strauss, but the man sat next to her was an attractive older man

"Agent Ardeen, this is your new unit chief. Aaron Hotchner"

"Agent Ardeen, welcome to the BAU"…

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**I'm sorry! I promised a background and I wrote one. Paigey-poo mentioned Vee had drug problems, so maybe I embellished a little… but who cares. I think it's a good story! So… now you've all been introduced to Veronica! Yey!**


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